Critique Welcomed St. Basil's Chapel On A Wet, Dreary Day

[Brian Moore]

This is in Houston, Texas. Shot with my Olympus OM2n and Olympus 35/2.8 shift lens with Kodak Tri-X 400 film.

Normally I process my B&W film in Rodinal. (Although I went through a period a few years ago using Caffenol as a developer.) However, I had recently used the last of my Rodinal and didn't have time to make the trek to the place that sells it. So I resolved to try HC110, which I knew my local camera shop had in stock. On the shelf, though, was also a couple of bottles of monobath developer. I was intrigued and decided to give it a go. So, this image was developed in Cinestill DF76 Monobath. It's a delight to use. A very quick process. However, I'll need to experiment with my agitation procedure since I had quite a bit of grain. Nevertheless, happy with it so far.

A one liter bottle is capable of developing at least 16 rolls of film. It lasts a year on the shelf unopened, and 2 months once opened. However, it's no where near as economical as Rodinal.

 

[Dave Farnes]

That is a very striking image, it works well. Did a search for the chapel, what a strange building!

 

[Brian Moore]

That is a very striking image, it works well. Did a search for the chapel, what a strange building!

Thanks Dave. Did you see the diagonal cross on the outside wall? Its a window. Sheds a cross-shaped light on the opposite wall inside. Unfortunately I didn't get inside to snap a picture--saw it on the web. Anyway, thanks again, Dave.

 

[Dave Farnes]

Yes, I saw that. Looked at lots of pictures on the web, I have never seen anything like it.

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Superb image, Brian. So much for the eye to contemplate. I love the bird, if that's what it is, at the top, and the architectural rip in the wall, and the three bells are perfectly placed. Superb!

 

[Brian Moore]

Superb image, Brian. So much for the eye to contemplate. I love the bird, if that's what it is, at the top, and the architectural rip in the wall, and the three bells are perfectly placed. Superb!

Thanks Rob. Yes it's a bird on top of the cross. I wish I had a little more space above the bird but the space tightened up when I adjusted the perspective to get the wall in the left parallel to the left edge of the frame. It wasn't that far off to begin with so I may have another look at this image in Lightroom and redo it. Thanks again, Rob.